Conservative media figures responded to riots following the funeral of Freddie Gray -- an unarmed man who died of severe, unexplained spinal cord injuries while in police custody -- by recommending that participants in the riots be shot, and blaming the outbreak of violence on Democratic leadership, President Obama, public schools, welfare, and single-parent families.

Conservative media figures are floating a baseless conspiracy theory that President Obama's televised statement on a CIA drone strike was scheduled in order to distract from news stories about Peter Schweizer's upcoming anti-Clinton book, Clinton Cash.

On April 23, President Obama announced that a CIA drone strike in Pakistan targeting Al Qaeda terrorists had also killed two of the hostages they were holding. Conservatives are suggesting Obama's announcement was timed to divert media attention away from stories prompted by Schweizer's book, but the administration was reportedly in the process of revealing the CIA operation before the latest round of Clinton Cash stories came out. Politico reported that "Senior U.S. officials" approached Wall Street Journal national security correspondent Adam Entous with details of the operation the night of April 22, since the "White House was planning to make the disclosure and decided to give Entous a heads up, with the request that he agree to an embargo."

Entous reported that "Typically, it can take the CIA weeks or longer to determine who was killed in a drone strike" and that the determination by U.S. intelligence agencies that the hostages had been killed in the strike had been made only "a few days ago." Entous further reported that after making that determination, the administration "then began the process of notifying relatives of the deceased as well as the Italian government and key congressional committees."

Opening his April 23 show, Rush Limbaugh said that while cable news was "devoted" to covering the Clinton Cash story, "all of a sudden, we were treated to a news story" about the drone strike, adding that the story was announced "right in the middle of the heat on the reporting of the fraud going on at the Clinton family foundation." Limbaugh added, "the conspiracy theories are alive and they're on fire."

On Fox News after Obama's statement, America's Newsroom anchor Bill Hemmer asked National Review senior editor Jonah Goldberg that since Al Qaeda terrorist Adam Gadahn has "been dead for four months, why did we not know that?" Goldberg said the release of information about the strike "does lend itself to the sort of convenient political timing accusation, but we don't know that that's true either," noting that he was originally booked on the program to discuss the book but was now discussing the operation.

Matt Drudge's Drudge Report has become the leading conservative media booster of Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker, promoting him for the Republican presidential nomination and proclaiming him the "clear GOP frontrunner."

Conservative media outlets, led by the Drudge Report, are floating the idea that former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton used a walker during a photo shoot for People magazine -- a baseless allegation the magazine quickly debunked.

On June 4, Peoplereleased an excerpt of its interview with Clinton, as well as the cover shot showing Clinton resting her hands on the back of a chair:

But People quickly debunked the baseless claims. Business Insider wrote that Nancy Valentino, senior vice president of communications at Time Inc., which publishes People, responded to the allegations (emphasis original):

Will Conservative Media Acknowledge His Crimes?

Dinesh D'Souza, the right-wing media darling who conservatives had claimed was targeted for prosecution because he is a critic of the Obama administration, has pleaded guilty to charges of campaign finance fraud.

D'Souza, famous for producing an anti-Barack Obama film rife with lies and outlandish claims, was indicted by the FBI in January and accused of violating campaign finance laws by "arranging excessive campaign contributions to a candidate for the U.S. Senate," and allegedly reimbursing "people who he had directed to contribute $20,000" to the unnamed candidate. On May 20 D'Souza pleaded guilty to violating campaign finance laws and making false statements. He will be sentenced in September and likely faces imprisonment of ten to 16 months.

Right-wing media figures -- many of whom went to bat for D'Souza's flawed film -- rallied to the filmmaker's defense following his initial indictment, claiming he was being prosecuted for his political beliefs. Fox News host Sean Hannity labeled D'Souza "the latest victim to be targeted by the Obama White House." Matt Drudge accused Attorney General Eric Holder of "unleashing the dog" on "Obama critics," and conspiracy theorist Alex Jones responded to the charges, saying, "This is like Nazi Germany ... once they're done with these guys, they're coming after you and I." Radio host Laura Ingraham characterized the indictment as being "more about stifling political dissent" than any serious allegations of wrongdoing, and Rush Limbaugh described it as an effort to "criminalize" conservatives.

Fox News repeatedly hosted D'Souza, providing a platform for the filmmaker to defend himself against the charges and issue baseless accusations at the Obama administration.

During one such interview in February, Fox host Megyn Kelly said the charges "raised red flags for some because D'Souza, who has pleaded not guilty, is behind the box office hit 2016: Obama's America, a film that is very critical of the president." D'Souza responded that he couldn't speak about the case specifically, but that he knows "for a fact" that Obama was personally unnerved by his film and said, "I am a public critic of the president, and I do recognize this has made me, to some degree, vulnerable to some forms of counter-attack."

This right-wing media defense was reportedly part of a deliberate plan by D'Souza. The New York Times reported in April that, in a conversation with one of his alleged straw donors, D'Souza said that if he were charged "he might plead guilty, but would initially plead not guilty because that 'gives him a window of opportunity to get his story out there.'"

Conservative pundits were more than happy to oblige this desire. Now will those who championed D'Souza's virtuousness finally condemn his crimes?

For her part, Ingraham will not. She responded immediately to news of the plea by downplaying the seriousness of the crime and doubling down on her claim that D'Souza was prosecuted for political reasons.

Following the announcement Thursday that conservative commentator and filmmaker Dinesh D'Souza has been charged with violating federal campaign finance laws, his allies are claiming that the move is evidence of a conspiracy by the Obama administration to silence its critics.

D'Souza has been a fixture in conservative media circles for years, and his laughable 2012 documentary 2016: Obama's America became a surprise critical success thanks in part to the support of his media allies. Reuters reports that D'Souza "has been indicted by a federal grand jury for arranging excessive campaign contributions to a candidate for the U.S. Senate," allegedly reimbursing "people who he had directed to contribute $20,000" to the unnamed candidate (reportedlyWendy Long).

Matt Drudge tweeted that the indictments against D'Souza and former Republican Virginia Governor Bob McDonnell are evidence that Attorney General Eric Holder is "unleashing the dogs" on "Obama critics."

In a panicked video headlined "Emergency: Obama Launches Purge" posted on his YouTube channel last night, conspiracy theorist Alex Jones told viewers that "America is going over the edge," adding, "I actually am scared." According to Jones, the charges against former Gov. McDonnell are "trumped up garbage" (for what it's worth, conservatives like Byron York disagree, labeling the details "ugly, sordid, damning").

Pointing to the supposed persecution of D'Souza, Jones claimed that the administration is engaged in much worse behavior and warned, "The issue is here, they can find a mistake in your checking account and claim that it was fraud or wire fraud. They can do it to anybody." According to Jones, "this is like Nazi Germany" and "once they're done with these guys, they're coming after you and I."

The description posted on Jones' YouTube channel explains that this is an "Emergency Alert!!!," adding "This is it, we are in deep shit! If they get away with this they will come for all of us, that's how it works!!!" D'Souza has appeared on Jones' program to promote his movie.

Someone alert Bill O'Reilly, Matt Drudge, Michelle Malkin and the rest of the right-wing media team that spent last year alternately belittling and hysterically hyping Chicago crime: their argument just fell apart.

O'Reilly has alternately compared Chicago's murder rate to "many Holocausts," and "Afghanistan." The Drudge Report linked to 134 "CHICAGOLAND" crime headlines last year, all meant to convey the image of a lawless city on the verge of bloody collapse. And Malkin let loose with her usual invective, denouncing Chicago as one of many Democratic-run "hellholes"; urban centers teeming with "juvenile delinquency, organized crime, ruinous government dependency, corruption and out-of-control spending."

Conservative conspiracists such as Rush Limbaugh even claimed Democratic politicians want the city's murder rate to remain high so they can use the killings to advocate for stronger gun laws. It's all part of a larger conservative media movement to portray Obama's former hometown as being driven under by murder and violence. They seem to want the city to become a symbol of doom and "urban decay," just as conservative pundits have enjoyed mocking Detroit's tough times.

It was also part of a larger, racially-tinged and hollow attempt in the wake of the Trayvon Martin trial to accuse Obama of ignoring crime, which according to the conservative media telling is raging out of control. (It's not; it remains on a steady decline.)

But suddenly the Chicago taunts have gone quiet. Suddenly the claims that strict gun laws are useless and that Democratic mayors oversee killings zones have disappeared. No more "CHICAGO LAND" links or cries of "Holocaust," and Malkin has for now stopped referring to Chicago as "America's Bloody City."

Why? Because even world-class misinformers like those would have a tough time making a case against "Obama's Chicago," given the fact that the murder rate there last year fell to its lowest level since Lyndon Johnson was president, while the booming metropolis welcomed a record number of 46 million tourists last year.

That's right, despite the endless right-wing attacks on Chicago and the permanent conservative depiction of the Second City as a hell hole, Chicago last year experienced the fewest murders since 1965; 413 in 2013. (Context: Chicago at its worst tallied 943 murders in 1992.) The city's overall crime rate in last year fell to a level not seen since 1972, and every one of the Chicago's 22 police districts registered a decrease in crime last year.

A new study from The New Republic determined that the Drudge Report's use of race-baiting headlines has soared in the last five years, a fact that lends context to the recent flood of conservative media amplifying random, interracial crimes and baselessly assigning them a racial motive.

Matt Drudge's conservative website Drudge Report is infamous for its obsessive coverage of alleged black-on-white crime and race-baiting headlines. But it's only getting worse, according to a new analysis by The New Republic. The magazine analyzed Drudge's use of race-related terms in headlines after 2008 -- the year President Obama established himself as a national figure with his first presidential campaign -- with Drudge headlines before 2008, and the results are striking. According to the analysis, since 2008, Drudge headlines:

Referencing "racism" have more than tripled

With the term "racist" have nearly doubled

Containing "black" and "crime" have quadrupled, and

Have included the n-word eight times, a slur not found in Drudge headlines before 2008.

Notably, the analysis highlighted that Drudge often altered headlines to inject a racial component when the original source contained none. This method of race-baiting has spilled over into the broader media. Recently, conservative outlets have seized upon local crime stories and baselessly assigned them racial motives when no such evidence existed. This spate of reckless race-baiting has been repeatedly accompanied by inapt comparisons to the killing of Trayvon Martin, an attempt to highlight a supposed double standard among civil rights leaders and media figures.

When a video of three teenage students beating up another student on a Florida school bus surfaced in early August, local media reported that the attack was in retaliation for the victim notifying school officials that the three teens tried to sell him drugs. But because the perpetrators happened to be black and the victim white, conservative media broke into a chorus of race-baiting, complaining that civil rights leaders hadn't spoken about the assault. Fox News bragged about its insertion of race into the crime, highlighting that it was the only network to bring race "to the forefront" on the story.

When three teens -- two black, one white -- allegedly shot and killed an Australian college student last month because they were "bored," law enforcement officials emphasized there was no evidence "to indicate that the killing of Christopher Lane was related to either his race or to his nationality."

Undeterred by facts, right-wing media again repeatedlymanufactured a racial motive. Fox argued that the murder was "likely motivated by race" and even criticized other media outlets for "ignoring the race issue" in the crime. Drudge featured photographs of the two black suspects, neglecting to include the photo of their alleged white accomplice.

Casting a wide net and always willing to promote whoever will mount attacks against President Obama, conservative commentators have recently reached out all the way to Moscow to embrace their latest champion, Russian president Vladimir Putin. The more he criticizes Obama for wanting to mount military strikes against the Syrian government for gassing its own citizens, the more Putin's comments are cheered by conservatives here.

The newfound affection is downright bizarre considering Russia, and the former Soviet Union, has for decades been the epicenter of right wing suspicion and hostility; the proverbial Evil Empire. And in terms of the current debate regarding Syria, Putin is isolating himself from the international community. As USA Todaynoted this week, "Russian President Vladimir Putin's strident defense of a Syrian regime that has killed tens of thousands of its people in a civil war that has divided him from many world powers viewing Syria as a humanitarian disaster that demands intervention."

Putin's an outlier with very little international leverage or power. But because he's publicly opposing Obama he's treated as a right-wing folk hero in America. That's how deep the hatred for Obama runs in today's conservative media circles.

Note that late last moth, just hours before Obama addressed the nation regarding Syria, Matt Drudge bizarrely tweeted that "Putin is the leader of the free world."

In an attempt to promote stereotypes of African-Americans as violent and dangerous, Matt Drudge is featuring on his website the photos of two black teenagers who allegedly killed an Australian athlete, leaving out the photo of their alleged white accomplice.

On August 16, Australian baseball player Christopher Lane was shot and killed while jogging in Oklahoma. Two black teenagers have been charged with first-degree murder in the case while a white teenager has been charged as an accessory for allegedly driving the getaway car. Conservative media have suggested that the shooting was racially motivated, despite the fact that one of the alleged perpetrators was white and that the local district attorney said he has seen nothing to "indicate that the killing of Christopher Lane was related to either his race or to his nationality."

Conservative commentator Pat Buchanan, who has a long record of bigoted commentary, claimed during a Fox News appearance that the murder is part of a societal trend in which "interracial violence is overwhelmingly black-on-white." Drudge is featuring that commentary under photos of the two black teens charged with murder, leaving out their alleged white accomplice.

Less than 24 hours after Alex Jones theorized that a "weather weapon" could have been used to cause the devastating Oklahoma tornado, conservative gossip Matt Drudge returned to his pattern of promoting the conspiracy theorist.

On May 21, Jones told a caller that the government has the ability to "create and steer groups of tornadoes" and that if people spotted helicopters and small aircraft "in and around the clouds, spraying and doing things" in Oklahoma, it could be evidence that a "weather weapon" was used.

Today Drudge prominently links to a story on Jones' website Infowars in the upper left hand corner of his site. The linked story claims that "armed Homeland Security guards" were "policing free speech" by appearing outside an IRS building in St. Louis during a Tea Party protest.

Drudge later changed the headline, linking to the same story:

Media Matters has previously documented that Drudge has linked to Jones at least 244 times in the last two years, and that Drudge contributor Joseph Curl worked with Jones to "crash" a party being held by former Bush staffers.

Jones hailed Drudge for pushing "into the mainstream media" his conspiracy theory that the Department of Homeland Security was stockpiling ammunition for use against American citizens while Drudge said 2013 would be the "year of Alex Jones."

We're at the point now where conservatives are going to have to start acknowledging that Barack Obama is the most talented politician in American history. By their own reckoning, the president's five years in office have been marked by so many Watergates, Iran-Contras, and combinations thereof that he should have been driven from office several times over by this point. And yet Obama was easily reelected and enjoys an approval rating in the mid to high-40s. How is this possible?

The explanation, it turns out, is the same explanation the right turns to whenever faced with political adversity: the media. It's all the media's fault. The corruption and various misdeeds of the Obama administration are manifest, but the public never catches on because the press covers it all up and throws out distractions to keep attention focused elsewhere.

When you actually write it out like that it sounds crazy. Because it is. It assumes a) close, unseen coordination between the administration and every major news outlet in America; b) close, unseen coordination between news outlets that are ostensibly competing against one another; and c) widespread moral vacuity among government officials and journalists that enables them to enthusiastically scrub away legal and ethical violations.

But that's what they're going with. Wednesday's House Oversight Committee hearing into the Benghazi attacks didn't quite live up to the pre-hearing promises of political "fireworks" and "bombshells." The morning after the hearing, FoxNews.com published an op-ed by Dan Gainor of the Media Research Center arguing that the Obama administration had "cover[ed] up four murders after the fact" in Benghazi and "with a few notable exceptions, the American media haven't just let them get away it. Heck, they've helped." Now, had the Obama administration actually tried to cover up the fact that four people were killed in Benghazi, that would be a hell of a scandal. But that didn't happen. To my knowledge, no one has even attempted that accusation before now. But that what's Gainor thinks Benghazi is about and he thinks the mainstream press (of which The Daily Show's Jon Stewart is a member, apparently) are the sort of moral monsters who would sign on for such a cover-up.

The ties between conspiracy theorist Alex Jones and right-wing megaphone Matt Drudge remain strong, with Jones revealing that he spent time yesterday with one of Drudge's employees and crediting Drudge with pushing one of his conspiracy theories "into the mainstream media."

Matt Drudge, who has described 2013 as the "year of Alex Jones," promoted Jones' website, Infowars, 244 times over the last two years and 50 times since the year began on The Drudge Report. Conservatives have urged Drudge to stop linking to Jones after the latter suggested the Boston Marathon bombings were a "false flag" attack perpetrated by the federal government.

On his radio show today, Jones said he was "hanging out" with The Drudge Report's Joseph Curl at a hotel in Houston, Texas where the pair tried "to crash the private Bush-Cheney party" being held in concert with the dedication ceremony for President George W. Bush's presidential library.

Drudge Report Has Linked To Jones' Infowars Site 244 Times In Two Years

Matt Drudge has long been conspiracy theorist Alex Jones' biggest ally. According to a Media Matters review, the heavily-trafficked Drudge Report has promoted at least 50 separate articles at Jones' Infowars website in 2013, and has linked to at least 244 different articles on the site in the past two years.

Drudge announced this week that he had privately told friends that 2013 would be the "year of Alex Jones." Considering Drudge's penchant for promoting Jones and his Infowars website, those comments are more of a promise than a prediction.

Alex Jones is a radio host famous for pushing absurd conspiracy theories about a host of issues, including that the U.S. government perpetrated or was otherwise involved in the 9-11 attacks, the Sandy Hook elementary school massacre, the Oklahoma City bombing, the Space Shuttle Colombia disaster, and the Aurora movie theater shooting.

Jones has lately made headlines for his most recent conspiracy that the Boston Marathon bombings were a "false flag" attack staged by the government. Drudge has provided several links to Jones' site in the days since Jones started floating Boston conspiracies, including an article highlighting the father of the bombing suspects claiming his sons had been set up.

The links to Jones' site in the wake of the Boston bombings are not surprising; he has sent a steady stream of traffic there in 2013.

Among the fifty Infowars pieces promoted by Drudge so far in 2013: a storymulling over claims that Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez may have been "surreptitiously" given cancer, possibly by the U.S. government; numerousarticles promoting conspiracies about supposedly ominous ammunition purchases made by the Department of Homeland Security; and a storycomparing Obama to "other tyrants" -- including Stalin, Hitler, and Mao -- that have "used kids as props."

Drudge has been consistently linking to Jones' site for years (Drudge Report also features two permanent links to the Infowars mainpage). Among the 244 Infowars articles Drudge has promoted since April 2011:

A November 2012 article promoting claims that James Holmes, the man currently on trial for the mass shooting at an Aurora, Colorado movie theater, may actually have been under the influence of CIA "mind control." The piece was based around a story told by an "alleged inmate" supposedly in jail with Holmes, who claimed Holmes told him he was "programmed" to kill by an "evil" therapist.

A July 2012 post highlighting an interview between Jones and Joseph Farah, editor of conspiracy website WND. During that interview, Farah suggested that if Obama were re-elected, people like him and Jones would be "hunted down like dogs."

A March 2012 piece suggesting that the death of conservative publisher Andrew Breitbart may not have been the result of natural causes, but instead related to a "damning" video about President Obama Breitbart had supposedly planned to release the day of his death.

An April 2011article responding to President Obama's release of his long-form birth certificate headlined, "New Obama Birth Certificate is a Forgery." The story states: "Our investigation of the purported Obama birth certificate released by Hawaiian authorities today reveals the document is a shoddily contrived hoax. Infowars.com computer specialists dismissed the document as a fraud soon after examining it."

On April 23 Matt Drudge, owner and operator of the right-wing content aggregator The Drudge Report, tweeted that he "privately told friends" that 2013 would be the "year of Alex Jones." Drudge has linked to the radio host and conspiracy-monger several times following the Boston Marathon bombings.

On his personal twitter feed, Drudge predicted that 2013 would be the "year of Alex Jones," praising his show as "one hell of a broadcast in such homogenized media!" In the wake of the Boston Marathon bombings, Drudge linked to articles on Jones' website Infowars, including stories that called Boston a "police state" during the manhunt for the alleged perpetrators, and a post accusing the Obama administration of covering up the involvement of a Saudi student who was later declared a victim of the attack:

Jones made news following the April 15 bombings at the Boston Marathon after he suggested that the blasts were staged by the U.S. government, calling the event a "false flag":

Jones elaborated on his initial comment during his show later that night, saying: "You saw them stage Fast and Furious. Folks, they staged Aurora, they staged Sandy Hook. The evidence is just overwhelming. And that's why I'm so desperate and freaked out. This is not fun, you know, getting up here telling you this. Somebody's got to tell you the truth."

The government is using products like juice boxes to "encourage homosexuality with chemicals so that people don't have children."

The U.S. government was behind the 9/11 attacks. Jones describes himself as being on "the front lines of the growing global information war from ground zero to the occult playgrounds of the power-mad elite. Jones predicted the attacks on September 11th, 2001 and is considered one of the very first founding fathers of the 9-11 Truth Movement."

The government has set up FEMA concentration camps in America, and "the military-industrial complex is transforming our once free nation into a giant prison camp."

President Obama is transforming the United States into "something that resembles Nazi Germany, with forced National Service, domestic civilian spies, warrantless wiretaps, the destruction of the Second Amendment, FEMA camps and Martial Law."

The New York Times was forced to issue two corrections after relying on Capitol Hill anonymous sourcing for its flawed report on emails from former Secretary of State and Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton. The Clinton debacle is the latest example of why the media should be careful when relying on leaks from partisan congressional sources -- this is far from the first time journalists who did have been burned.

Several Fox News figures are attempting to shift partial blame onto Samuel DuBose for his own death at the hands of a Cincinnati police officer during a traffic stop, arguing DuBose should have cooperated with the officer's instructions if he wanted to avoid "danger."

Iowa radio host Steve Deace is frequently interviewed as a political analyst by mainstream media outlets like NPR, MSNBC, and The Hill when they need an insider's perspective on the GOP primary and Iowa political landscape. However, these outlets may not all be aware that Deace gained his insider status in conservative circles by broadcasting full-throated endorsements of extreme right-wing positions on his radio show and writing online columns filled with intolerant views that he never reveals during main stream media appearances.